


Reflect on Lost Memories

by Bloopydoo (UNDERTALESIN)



Category: Ghost of Tsushima (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Ignore the fact that Shimura should have died even if Jin spares him, Shimura gets dementia, getting knocked out in the prologue probably didn't help, sad jin, shhh - Freeform, shitty fate rng, we ignore that in this house
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:07:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27298390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UNDERTALESIN/pseuds/Bloopydoo
Summary: In which it honestly might have better if Jin killed his uncle in the cemetery.tw: Dementia, people die, it's sad, indirect mention of Taka's fate
Relationships: Jin & Lord Shimura, Jin & Yuna, Possible Jin/Yuna
Comments: 15
Kudos: 20





	Reflect on Lost Memories

**Author's Note:**

> Went down a YT rabbit hole and accidentally listened to Shimura's theme on 0.75x speed... and it reminded me of Burning Memory and Everything at the End of Time.  
> Culminating in this. Enjoy!

The castle felt empty. That was the only way Jin could describe it, in a way that made sense.

Empty. Utterly, utterly empty.

The tatami had been taken up, what could be saved was set aside and what couldn't had been taken away to be disposed of.

How could Castle Shimura feel like this? So different to the home it'd been all those years ago, when his worst nightmares had merely been the death of his father and not Taka, Ryuzo, Komoda beach...

Sometimes he wished he could go back. To have everyone back again.

-

He'd spared his uncle that day, refused to kill the last member of his family. Simply walked away, eschewing the clinging remnants of his past and the code his uncle held dear.

He'd rested decently, that night. Woke in the morning ready to face the new dawn, and whatever might come next.

It never occurred to him that his uncle might not have been the same.

The Jito was infrequently seen in public after that. Most assumed it was a chastisement from the shogun that prompted it, or the embarrassment of Jin's actions.

He hadn't been prepared for the simple fact that his uncle was just... Old. Had never considered something else might be at play.

-

Lord Shimura had worn a brilliant facade for seven years. Seven years, before things had come crumbling down.

He'd begun to forget things. Little things at first, such as which dish was for dinner, or which brush he'd been using to write with, but things had spiralled.

After he'd nearly sent a letter to the shogun that should have gone to Ishikawa, he'd given up. Called doctors subtly, delegated tasks...

There was nothing that could be done. And thus began his slow decline.

-

It had been an odd day for Jin. First Ishikawa-sensei had turned up at his door, then he'd been whisked away to Castle Shimura. And no one had tried to shoot at him! That came as quite a surprise.

The biggest surprise had been when he was ushered into his uncle's study, and instead of being furious Shimura gestured tiredly for him to sit.

"Jin. It is... Good, to see you again."

Jin wasn't sure how to reply.

"Oji-san."

Shimura nodded to himself, solemnly.

"I... As of late, I find myself growing strange. My mind... Is not what it used to be. Therefore, I request you stay here to manage Tsushima, in my stead, until a replacement can be chosen."

Jin felt quite confused.

"Has the shogun sent a pardon? Or am I still a traitor?"

Shimura froze. He seemed to struggle to remember.

"He... Err... Did he?"

Jin was now confused _and_ worried.

Shimura shook his head to clear his thoughts.

"I want you to take over regardless, Jin. You're the only one I trust with this responsibility... Please."

And for the first time in a long time, for the man who had raised him, Jin agreed. And for a time, things were comfortable.

-

The problem wasn't that Tsushima didn't run smoothly. In fact, in the wake of the Mongol invasion the people of Izuhara, Toyotama and Kamiagata had worked together to try and rebuild the life they'd had before. Things ran easily, with infrequent need of oversight.

It was that Shimura was growing stranger with each passing day.

He was beginning to completely forget what he was doing in the middle of tasks, and was often in a reminiscent and melancholy mood. He mostly kept to his rooms, though Jin wandered in most evenings just to talk.

His uncle's demeanour toward him grew warmer, more affectionate. Closer to what he remembered from his childhood.

When Jin realised his uncle had started to forget that the Mongol invasion had even happened, Jin panicked. He went straight to the people he thought he could trust.

-

Ishikawa-sensei tried to calm him. Lady Masako stuck to advising him. Yuna came occasionally, to try and pull him from his duties and get him to unwind.

It was only through a letter left in Lord Shimura's strangely untidy study that he'd found out.

"When were you going to tell me that my uncle was losing his mind?"

Lady Masako glanced away. Ishikawa-sensei sighed. Yuna wasn't there, but he'd asked her earlier and she'd been confused too, simply assuming that Jin had been pardoned and welcomed back.

"We thought you'd figured it out. He just... He's old, Jin, and the Invasion took a toll on him."

Jin did his best not to crumple like paper.

"...So this has been going on for a while, then?"

Ishikawa-sensei nodded.

"I'm sorry, Jin."

Jin simply turned away, heading almost dazedly back into Shimura's study. Lady Masako and Ishikawa-sensei shared a glance, before going their separate ways.

-

Asking his uncle was painful. The way Shimura's expression seemed to shutter, closing off...

"Oji-ue, please. I... _Please_."

Shimura sighed, then nodded.

"My memory fails me more and more. Things people tell me... They are too strange. I... I remember you younger, Jin. More innocent. The boy I raised."

Jin flinched.

"...And when you no longer remember that? When you no longer remember me? When you no longer remember yourself?"

Shimura glanced away.

"...I don't know. My father died before he could experience anything like this."

Jin took an almost shaky breath.

"Oji-ue... Please try to remember me, for as long as you can. I only have you left."

Shimura had given him the happiest, warmest smile Jin had seen in years; even though it was tinged with sadness, it still reminded him of rapidly cooling autumn afternoons spent training as red leaves fell around them.

"I will try, Oikko. I will remember you, Jin, as long as I can."

-

Autumn gave way to winter as Shimura seemed to lose even more of himself. He kept forgetting where he was, kept murmuring "Kazumasa?" every time Jin walked in before correcting himself, kept asking after the sister he'd lost so long ago.

Every time Jin had to bring him back to reality, he seemed sadder. Crestfallen, broken in a way Jin had never seen him be before.

The sparring helped. When his uncle felt up to it, sometimes they'd spar with bokken in the courtyard. And he seemed clear-eyed, more cognizant, when they did so. But it melted all too quickly into the daze his uncle seemed to wander around in more and more often.

"I'm worried," he told Yuna one evening as they drank together, "I'm so scared of losing him. He's... He's all I have left."

Yuna sipped her sake quietly, cheeks pink from alcohol and winter chill both.

"I know how you feel. With Taka... I clung to him. He was my reason for everything, I put him before all else. And I was terrified of losing him."

She glanced over at Jin.

"Spend as much time with him as you can. Because when he's gone... There's no room for regrets."

-

Shimura started to become reclusive and quiet as the worst winter storms swirled around the castle. Jin would check in on his uncle and find him dressed in summer clothes, watching the snow fall through the open shoji. The tatami nearest the door started to get damaged from the constant snow exposure, not that Shimura noticed.

He became less coherent. Talking more like a young man, and then younger still. Jin found him sitting outside in the snow once, stubbornly protesting that he wasn't cold despite the snow clinging to his grey hair. He’d bundled his uncle back inside, and thank goodness he’d escaped any new illness or ailment.

And one night, Shimura didn't remember him anymore. Jin came in quietly, sliding open the shoji, to find Shimura with a tachi pointed right at him.

"...Oji-ue?"

Shimura tilted his head.

"I have no nephew..."

Jin grimaced.

"Do you remember your sister? She married Kazumasa Sakai?"

Shimura nodded, eyes narrowed.

"Were they expecting a child?"

Shimura relaxed slightly, though he still looked suspicious.

"They were. My sister was so sure it was a boy... She was going to name him-"

"Jin?"

Shimura nearly dropped the tachi.

"How did you know?"

Jin's eyes watered.

"They named me Jin Sakai. I've known for a while."

Shimura lowered the tachi, approaching carefully and scrutinising Jin carefully.

"...Oikko?"

Jin nodded. He hadn't missed the informal word choice, and held hope that his uncle might still remember him deep down.

Shimura, apparently satisfied, sheathed the tachi in a clearly instinctual manner. It was done with the grace of decades' practice, not conscious but remembered.

"My apologies for the cold reception."

Jin had brushed it off, and made sure to spend as much time with Shimura as he could. It helped, for a little while, but he soon found himself reminding Shimura who he was every day. He told no one but Yuna how much that hurt. She commiserated with him on lost family, and handed him another gourd of Kenji's best.

-

To think that what finally ended Lord Shimura, Jito of Tsushima, was a mere cold.

It had been going around the castle. Jin had done his best to protect his uncle, but one could only do so much. With so many people in close contact all the time... It was inevitable.

Shimura had become weakened, and almost frail. He spent much of his time sequestered away, reading and sometimes painting. Anything else tired him out far too much; the days of sparring in the courtyard with Jin were long past.

It was a hard week. It had been blisteringly cold, the days were short, tempers within the castle even shorter...

Lord Shimura fell ill. For a few days, Jin had thought it would pass. But the chills persisted, and got worse.

His beloved uncle passed in his sleep, as peacefully and serenely as Jin could have hoped for.

It still tore a hole in his heart, the edges far too raw and vulnerable to let even Yuna in.

-

They held the funeral. There were so few people left, to say their goodbyes. Just Jin, Ishikawa-sensei, Lady Masako and Yuna around a pyre, with Norio officiating.

So few of Tsushima's samurai clans left. Jin as the only remaining member of Clan Sakai. Most of Clan Adachi, gone, and Lady Masako perhaps attending in their stead. In Ishikawa-sensei, one who had left Clan Nagao; he certainly would not deign to be their representative even if it had mattered. A similar situation for Yuna and Clan Yarikawa, except Ujimasa might not have been welcome even if he had wanted to attend. Clan Kikuchi was entirely absent. No living members of Clan Shimura, which sent a spike of regret through Jin's heart.

 _"You could have been Jin Shimura,"_ whispered a treacherous voice in his heart which he suppressed as best he could.

When the time had come for remarks, Jin broke the ensuing silence.

"He died peacefully, and with dignity. I... I'm glad to have known him; he was an honorable man, a good uncle, and he will be missed."

"He did a good job raising you," Lady Masako commented as Ishikawa-sensei nodded his agreement.

Yuna patted Jin's arm wordlessly. Despite it all, the snow felt a tiny bit colder afterwards.

Maybe it was just the feeling of being alone.


End file.
